When Your Innie Meets Your Outie: Discovering Neurodivergence Through the Lens of Severance
SPOILER ALERT!!! (Please don’t read if you want to watch the TV series!)
There's a moment in the TV series Severance when Mark S., the "innie" version who exists only within the sterile confines of Lumon Industries, finds a note from his "outie" self. It's a simple message, but it carries a profound weight—a communication between two versions of the same person who have never met, who experience entirely different lives, and who have been deliberately kept separate.
I keep thinking about that moment.
Because I've been living my own form of severance. Only I didn't sign any paperwork. There was no surgical procedure. Just years of unknowingly building walls between the person I am and the person I thought I needed to be.
The Partition
For those unfamiliar with Severance, the premise is brilliantly unsettling. Workers at the mysterious Lumon Industries undergo a procedure that surgically divides their consciousness—creating an "innie" who exists only at work with no memories of their outside life, and an "outie" who lives in the world but has no recollection of what happens during work hours. Two separate identities sharing one body, never meant to communicate or connect.
I didn't realise until my 50s how perfectly this metaphor maps onto my own experience of undiagnosed neurodivergence.
For decades, I maintained my own partition. My "innie" was carefully constructed—she knew how to make appropriate eye contact, how to regulate her voice in social situations, how to put on a socially acceptable female smiling face, how to appear interested in small talk while her mind screamed for escape. She knew how to squash down hyperfixations, and hide overwhelm. She was "normal," but somehow knew that there was a feeling of difference she couldn’t quite put her finger on.
My "outie"—my authentic neurodivergent self—only emerged in private moments. In mini burnouts, in the joy of special interests that bubbled up through the workload of life. In the confusion about why everything seemed so much easier for other people.
The difference is that unlike Mark S., I was aware of both sides. I just didn't understand what it was.
The Glitches in the System
Severance is full of moments where the careful separation between innie and outie begins to break down. Memories leak through. Questions arise. The system isn't as perfect as Lumon claims.
My own severance started showing glitches in my 50s. I started noticing patterns. Why did I get on so well with late-diagnosed neurodivergent clients? Why did certain environments leave me completely drained? Why could I focus intensely on some tasks for hours while others felt impossible? Why were certain family members also a ‘bit different’?
Like the characters in Severance who begin finding clues about their other lives, I started uncovering evidence of my neurodivergence. Not just in current struggles, but looking back at my entire life. The signs had always been there—I just didn't have the language or framework to understand them.
The Reintegration
In Severance, the characters begin a dangerous journey toward reintegration—trying to connect their severed selves despite the systems designed to keep them apart.
My own reintegration began with following the clues. I immersed myself in lived-experience content – podcasts, autobiographies, videos. Words that finally gave shape to experiences I'd had my entire life. Labels that opened doors to understanding rather than closing them.
The hardest part wasn't the diagnosis itself. It was realising I’d spent half a century only getting glimpses of my outie.
Reintegration is messy. There's grief for the person you might have been had you known sooner. There's anger at the systems that made you (or your neurodivergent children) feel broken. There's relief at finally understanding. And there's the daunting task of figuring out which adaptations were necessary accommodations and which were harmful masking.
It means looking at your "innie" self—the masked version you presented to the world—and your "outie" self—the authentic neurodivergent person you've always been—and finding a way for them to communicate, to know each other, to become whole.
The New Protocol
In Severance, the separation is maintained through strict protocols, punishments, and reward systems. The innies are infantilised, kept in the dark, fed corporate propaganda. They're told that this separation is for their own good.
I realise now that I'd been following my own set of protocols. Rules I'd internalised from a neurotypical world:
Don't talk too much about your interests
Make eye contact, but not too much
Hide your sensory sensitivities
Push through exhaustion and overwhelm
Act "normal" at all costs.
The reintegration process means creating a new protocol. One based on self-knowledge and genuine need rather than camouflage. One that acknowledges my neurodivergence as a fundamental part of who I am, not a flaw to be hidden.
It means recognising when I need accommodations. Setting boundaries. Finding communities where masking isn't necessary. Learning which stims help me regulate. Understanding my sensory needs. Embracing hyperfixations as strengths rather than distractions.
It means allowing my "innie" and "outie" to finally meet, communicate, and eventually become one integrated person.
The Awakening
The most powerful moments in Severance come when characters experience brief awakenings—moments when their innie and outie consciousness blur, when they catch glimpses of their whole selves.
I've had my own awakenings. Moments of profound recognition when reading accounts from other neurodivergent people. The relief of making social plans fit for me rather than pushing through. The joy of deep diving into a special interest and being met with genuine interest rather than polite tolerance.
These awakenings can be disorienting. After decades of masking, authenticity feels foreign. Vulnerability feels dangerous. But they're also exhilarating—glimpses of a life where I don't have to maintain the exhausting partition between who I am and who I pretend to be.
The Revelation
In Severance, there's a stunning moment when an innie experiences the outside world for the first time. The overwhelm, the wonder, the confusion, the fear—it's all there.
Coming to understand your neurodivergence later in life carries some of that same intensity. It's stepping into a new way of experiencing yourself and the world. It's realising that what you thought was personal failure was actually your brain working exactly as it's designed to—just differently from the expected norm.
The revelation isn't that you're broken. It's that you were never meant to fit into the narrow definition of "normal" in the first place.
The Integration
I don't know how Severance will ultimately resolve its central conflict. Will the innies and outies find harmony? Will they fully integrate or learn to communicate across the divide? Will they dismantle the system that kept them separate?
I don't have all the answers for my own integration either. It's a ongoing process. Masking still happens but at least I notice it now and can be more purposeful about it, or have compassion for the part that is protected behind the mask in that moment. I'm learning to distinguish between harmful masking and helpful accommodation, between authenticity and rigidity.
What I do know is that the conversation between my innie and outie is an exciting one – with so much possibility in it. It’s refreshing to see the partitions coming down.
And in that conversation, I'm discovering a more complete version of myself. One who understands her needs and honours them. One who sees her neurodivergence not as something to hide but as an integral part of her creativity, her perspective, her gifts, and her challenges.
One who no longer needs to sever herself in order to survive.
The work continues. The protocols are being rewritten. And somewhere in that process, my innie and outie are becoming simply... me.
Severance-Inspired Journal Prompts
The Handshake Protocol: In Severance, innies and outies occasionally communicate through recorded messages. If you could leave a message for your masked self to discover (or vice versa), what would you say? What crucial understanding does one version of you need from the other?
The Wellness Session: When Lumon employees struggle, they're sent to the wellness counsellor who reads "meaningful" statements from their outie. Whar are the ‘meaningful statements’ your authentic neurodivergent self needs to hear when the burden of masking becomes too heavy. Then write three things your masking self needs to be acknowledged for.
The Break Room: In Severance, the break room isn't for rest—it's where employees are forced to repeatedly apologise for transgressions. How often have you made your authentic self apologise for natural neurodivergent traits or needs? What could be your statement of release that frees you from unnecessary apologies for the ways your brain naturally works.
I like how you mentioned grieving for the person you could have been, had you been diagnosed at a sufficiently early age. I felt that. That's a feeling that I had carried since late adolescence when I first began to recognize I was likely neurodivergent in some way, and felt even more keenly at around my mid thirties when I discovered that my actual neurotype was likely dyspraxia. However, I could never fully put my finger on that sense of grief until reading your description of it in this article. Thank you for that
This was very well written, I enjoyed how you related the show's plot points to neurodivergence. Thank you for not posting spoilers, I've yet to watch season 2 😋